Why the fascination for 1080p ??

You don't need a 1080p source to see the benefits of a 1920x1080 display.


For one, all non-CRT displays are "progressive". So, excluding CRT's, all 1920x1080 capable sets will be, defacto, displaying everything at 1080p.


Second, you won't see all of the resolution in a 1080i broadcast with a 1280x720 display, but you WILL see all of the resolution of a 720p and a 1080i broadcast on a 1920x1080 display.


It's pretty straight forward.


I have a hunch that in 5 years 1280x720 displays will be relegated to small, cheap and/or portable uses.


Sean

How about this analogy


dvd looked better than anything that came before it ( LD, VHS, BETA, CED etc.) on any old 480i analog display.


Then 480P ED TV sets came out and were able to upscale 480i DVD picture to a progressive picture or accept a progressive signal from the player and it looked better than it did on an interlaced display.


I for one do not want the display to be the limiting factor on the resolution I see when I watch something.


1080i will upscale very easily to 1080p just as 480i upscales easily to 480p.


Can you see the benefits of a progressive DVD picture over an interlaced one?

I will be playing Quake 4 (doom 3 engine) at 1800x900p - no overscan - that should look great.


All the HTPC stuff - photos (5 mega pixels) etc. will all be shown NON-interlaced.


Your argument is like saying "well, HDTV does not look that good so why bother".


I for one would rather play Doom3 at 1800x900 then 920x500 (to not get interlaced on my RPTV)



1024x680p is good (say a powerstrip 720p signal) but clearly 80% fewer pixels then a 1800x900p. If we can tweak the overscan then we could even do more. The problem: The currentl Geforce 6 chipset and ATI chipsets turn off AA past 1640 or 1800 - can't remember which. however, by then, the R500 series should be ok

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It looks like you're not understanding the replies.


1. There are several 1080i sources, which can be displayed unscaled as progressive images on a 1080p display.

2. More resolution for HTPC displays.


Two utterly valid (and obvious) reasons. What 720P sources are there, but I didn't see you asking why people want 720P displays.

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Kriore, I have raised the same issue elsewhere and am in your camp largely. I believe a well executed 720p would suffice for most (98%) But I'm also optimistic that a 1080p capable solution will likely handle the lessor resolutions with greater ease and less artifacts due to the higher resolution processing headroom. But nothing is without some tradeoffs and there are studies that suggest that 720p is superior for fast action scenes like sports but that 1080p is superior for slower and static scenes. To illiustrate the problem; I doubt that many here have actually seen a true 1080p native production as they are scarce. (Though I'm just as sure that a few have.)


Experience suggests that you are probably correct in recognizing we are far away (hopefully not 10yrs away!) from common 1080p broadcasts. The broadcasters want the bandwidth for more channels for one thing. The other is the installed base of HDTV is 720p and will be that way for at least another 2-3 years where it will start very slowly changing in the 1080p direction. Finally there are some in the broadcast industry who think 1080p will only be used for archiving digital assets and will never be commonly broadcast. (i'm not kidding)


So my advice is to seek out a well made 720p solution live with it for a few years and upgrade to 1080p when and if the content stream justifies it and the premiums charged for it subside a little.

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And most people can't tell the difference between DVDs and HDTV. Thats why HD-DVDs will never catch on (or at least for another 10 years). They need to offer something that DVDs do not have and slightly better video quality is not gonna do it for people to throw away all of their dvds to get new ones. VHS to DVD was a major upgrade, whereas DVD to HD-DVD is not.


DVDs are here to stay and they can improve over time with better quality and with better DVD players that people would be willing to upgrade (at least more than upgrading their entire collection)

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Heh. Good quote.. I am waiting for 1080p simply for my HTPC.. which can display WMVHD, which is... you guessed it... 1080p. But more importantly, I can obtain a higher resolution and thats what its all about. The only thing I miss about my standard computer monitor.


Couple things I'm waiting for:

1. Dolby Digital encoding on-chip on an Athlon 64 chipset.

2. 1080p display

3. 2006 Corvette Z06.

4. 2006/7 Mustang Cobra.


yeah thats about it..

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I like your list; I would not mind that dolby digital encoding natively on 64 bit Athlons at all